Summary of fire event: About 100 firefighters from 10 departments battled into the night to control a blaze that gutted a hotel in Seabrook near the Johnson Space Center."The fire was in some hidden crawlspaces which allowed it to take and go vertical and ultimately go horizontally across the attic space at the roofline," Seabrook Fire Chief Ray Cook said.Firefighters smashed through windows to get to the flames that kept growing by the second at the Hampton Inn in Seabrook.

The alarms sounded multiple times late Thursday afternoon to alert crews on the roof to come down to the ground and to the crews inside to leave. As the fire grew to a third alarm, the ten fire departments decided to fight the fire defensively from the ground. For more than five hours, firefighters worked to put out the stubborn blaze, and even pumped water from Clear Lake just across the street.

Everyone inside was able to get out quickly and no one was injured, but the hotel was heavily damaged. More than 14 hours later, crews continued to tap out flare-ups at the hotel early Friday.

Investigators confirmed smoke detectors and the sprinkler system inside the hotel were properly working and that the building was inspected within the last year. Investigators will now put their notes together and determine a cause. Cook said the building is considered a total loss, and it will take several days to reach a conclusion. The building has been turned back over to its owners.

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Following a second quarter 2018 pre-tariff run-up in the volume of steel used to manufacture cold-formed steel (CFS) framing products, the latest report by the Steel Framing Industry Association (SFIA) finds that CFS manufacturing declined by 9 percent in the third quarter of 2018 to 273,682 total tons (raw tons before processing). Most companies surveyed in SFIA's US Nonresidential Volume Report indicated a belief that much of the inventory built up in the second quarter had largely worked through the system, and that manufacturing volume was beginning to tick up at the end of the third quarter. The complete publication containing data and analysis, including results of a survey of market sentiment, is available at this Link.

The SFIA Contractor Certification, introduced in March is off to a strong start with the first two companies awarded certification for both Nonstructural and Structural framing and 20 additional companies currently in the certification process. This new certification, which promotes best practices and continuous improvement, will be promoted to general contractors and owners looking for contractors with CFS expertise, high levels of training, and quality assurance.

A Fire Service Professional’s ViewThe increased use of wood framing in mid-rise buildings has been accompanied by a growing incidence of major fires that have destroyed these combustible structures both during construction